‘Human Lanterns’ or — Raise The (Bloody) Red Lantern?
It’s not just lanterns that Chung Sun’s ‘Human Lanterns’ (1982) raises but also a singular question, namely — what genre is this film exactly? Horror? Wuxia? Comedy? Ghost story? Martial art actioner? The fantastic news is that the answer is… all of them! And it’s awesome!
Arrogant master swordsman Lung and village head Master Tan get into a rivalry concerning the town’s annual lantern-making contest, as you do. Lung is determined to show Master Tan who has the best lantern so hires an old rival of his, Chun-fang who has given up his sword and is now an expert lantern maker, to construct for him the most exquisite lantern ever made. However, Chun-fang has an old score to settle with Lung (as well as a somewhat unusual approach to making his lanterns which I won’t spoil but there’s a subtle clue in the title) and it is not long before women start disappearing, kidnapped by some horrendous skeletal looking kung-fu monkey-monster, and with the blame seeming to be pointing to either Lung or Tan. Could it be that these two opponents are being set-up? Will Lung and Tan kill each other before Sergeant Poon can uncover the truth? And with all the fighting has everyone forgotten there’s meant to be a lantern-making contest going on?!
This is a seriously fun and hugely enjoyable movie, although what’s initially most striking about ‘Human Lanterns’ is how good it looks with splashes of bright colour, nice set design and an overall production that seems to belie what must have been a pretty small budget. There are colourful mansions, dark caves, scary gardens and mist filled forests to name a few. This film has bags of atmosphere. It’s also nicely directed with a real sense of effort and invention working away behind the camera and handling all the mix of styles (horror, kung fu, comedy etc) deftly, at times feeling as though King Hu had made a low budget Sam Raimi horror movie.
Best of all though is the pacing as once things kick off, which they do pretty quickly, the film not only never lets up but keeps ramping up the energy meaning the film just barrels along. There are fights aplenty, all of which are fun and exciting, and all the action is augmented by some truly striking and pretty grisly body-horror meets Hammer Horror blood-soaked gothic lunacy going on in Chun-fang’s basement, the huge mechanised grinding-machine dripping in blood being a particular highlight.
‘Human Lanterns’ might have a title suggesting a sleazy exploitation flick but, in reality, it’s a seriously enjoyable and nicely made martial arts/horror film. If you’re a fan of ‘The Legend of The Seven Golden Vampires’ 1974) you’ll get an absolute blast out of this one.
